We’ve been in this hole before, and we know the way out
There are updated numbers on the 2024 election, and as with so many other things this day, it’s not clear whether we should take solace in it or be infuriated by it. With straggler ballots still being counted, it’s looking like Trump will have only won the popular vote by about 1%. Trump will also have only won Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania by about 1%. In other words we came that close to avoiding this nightmare. Why am I bothering to rehash this?
Because it turns out Trump didn’t really get any more support in 2024 than he got in 2020. It was really just a matter of the same bottom feeders, broken people, extremists, and dummies in the middle who voted for him again. The difference in this election is that our side got much fewer votes in 2024 than in 2020. There are a number of reasons for this. The media decided to dishonestly destroy Biden’s candidacy in coordinated fashion with barely a hundred days left. Kamala didn’t have nearly enough time to ramp up. And the media normalized Trump to the point that a lot of voters in the middle stayed home this time instead of voting for the Democrats.
Again, why am I bothering to rehash this? Because in addition to the immediate battle in which we defeat as many of Trump’s cabinet nominees as possible and try to drive his approval rating into the gutter before he even takes office, we need to keep one eye on the longer term. There will be midterm elections in 2026. We don’t know what anything will look like by then, but we have to try to win them. Republicans will be emboldened to cheat more than ever, but elections are still largely controlled at the state and local level. If we can survive two years, force the midterm elections to happen, and win the House and Senate, we can crush Trump and his fascist clan after that. So we have to focus on what went wrong in 2024 in order to learn what to do differently by 2026.
2026 obviously isn’t a presidential election, so we won’t have to worry about the top of the ticket or how it impacts the downticket. It’ll be entirely about focusing on the most competitive House and Senate races, just like it always is. But we do know that the media was the biggest problem in 2024, and the media is already lining up to surrender to Trump before he takes office. So the media will likely be of no help in 2026 either.
Where does this leave things? It means it’ll once again be up to us. It’s our job to drive Trump’s approval rating as low as possible. It’s our job to push his scandals and corruption and extremism front and center. It’s our job to win the 2026 election, which will help make sure there is a 2028 election.
Remember, as hopeless as 2024 feels right now, we came within about 1% of the vote in three states from finishing off Trump entirely. We came that close. It stings that we didn’t quite get there. But damn if we didn’t try. And we’ll keep trying. If we can spend these two years turning the public tide in our favor, we still have a way out of this nightmare. Let’s give it a try. It beats the alternative of rolling over and giving up, which is not an option.
